De Vita Beata)

The Roman Stoics: Seneca and Epictetus 2 Seneca’s ‘One the Happy Life’ (De Vita Beata) 1. Defining Happiness (1) Seneca’s beata renders the Greek eudaimonia. This means something like ‘well- spirited’ or ‘well looked after the gods’; instead of ‘happiness’, we could say ‘flourishing’, which emphasizes the dynamic nature—‘happy-ing’ is not a state. A eudaimon life is one that is well lived, or is in some sense a successful human life. (2) Aside. In a famous passage, Socrates suggests that the life that does not involve self-examination and reflection is not a human life at all—it is a life that is ‘not alive for man’ (ou biōtos anthrōpō, Apology 38a). (3) The first definition (3.3): ‘the life in agreement (conveniens) with its own nature’. This is the most Stoic characterization of happiness, and has a long history. (a) Zeno, ‘a good flow of life’ (εὔροια βίου, euroia biou)—so the end (telos) is the best possible condition for human beings relative to their nature, hence, ‘living in agreement’ (ὁµολογουµένως ζῆν, homologoumenōs zēn);1 (b) Cleanthes, ‘living in agreement with nature’ (to homologoumenōs tē phusei zēn); (c) Chrysippus, ‘living in agreement with one’s own nature and that of the whole’ or ‘living in accordance with experience of what happens by nature’; (d) Panaetius, ‘living in agreement with the tendencies bestowed on us by nature’ or ‘living in agreement with the human constitution’; (e) Posidonius, ‘living as a student of the truth and order of the whole, and helping to promote this as far as possible, completely uninfluenced by the irrational part of the soul’. See also The Happy Life 8.2. Upshot. To live well is to be in tune with nature (the cosmic flow of things), and also the internal harmonious or coherent flow of one’s mental (rational, intellectual) life. Hence, the early Stoics regard virtue (ἀρετή, aretē) as ‘a consistent character’ (διάθεσις ὁµολογουµένις, diathesis homologoumenis), where ‘homologue’ means something like ‘maximally self-agreeing’ or ‘internally consistent’ (see 8). Virtue is a benefit, has utility: a state of mind that enables us to act as one ‘should’ according to nature; and such acts require knowledge (including knowing what is valuable or what is suitable; what is up to me and what is not). So, it is a state of mind where everything one holds true integrates or fits together into a systematic and stable body of knowledge. In addition to ethics, logic and physics are necessary for a ‘fully rounded’ life: in order to act morally, we need to train and practice good (clear, coherent) thinking and reasoning—epistemic norms or ‘virtues’, such as aiming at the truth—and we need to extend our grasp of the natural world. (4) The second definition (4.2): ‘the mind looking down on the things of fortune, joyous in virtue’. Seneca means magnanimity, which renders megalopsuchia (µεγαλοψυχία), i.e. greatness of soul. Aristotle describes this as the feature of someone who regards herself/himself worthy of great things; in contrast, a ‘little- souled’ person thinks she/he is worthy of less than she/he is (NE IV.3). (5) The third definition (4.2): ‘the mind’s undefeated strength, well versed in the ways of the world, calm in action, with much humanity and concern for those it has 1 For these sources, see Long, A. A. & Sedley, D. N. (1987). The Hellenistic Philosophers. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press (§63 = LS 63). OUDCE Michaelmas Term 2019 | Peter Wyss contact’. Courage and endurance seem involved here; and also care, in the sense of a love for humanity—agapē (ἀγάπη); perhaps akin to Hume’s sentiment of humanity (e.g., EPM 5.18) or sympathy with fellow humans. (6) The fourth definition (4.2): ‘to whom nothing is good or bad except a good or bad mind; who is the cultivator of the morally good, content with virtue; who is neither buoyed up nor broken by changes of fortune; who knows that there is no greater good than that which he can give himself; to whom true pleasure will be scorning pleasures (vera voluptas erit voluptatum contemptio)’. An appeal to sound- mindedness, and perhaps euthumia (εὐθυµία), which for early Stoics is a ‘joy in one’s way of life or in being satisfied with everything’ (SVF III 432). (7) The fifth definition (4.3): ‘a free, upright, fearless, and stable mind, placed beyond fear and beyond desire, to whom the only good is what is morally good (honestas), the only bad thing, disgrace (turpitudo), and the rest are a worthless swarm of things that neither subtract anything from the happy life nor add anything to it’. The Stoics accept ‘true passions’, eupatheiai (εὐπάθειαι), which are rational replacements for the ‘unruly’ common passions: joy, (χαρά, chara), caution or watchfulness (εὐλάβεια, eulabeia), and wishing (βούλησις, boulēsis). (8) The sixth definition (5.3): ‘right and certain judgement, and unchangeable’. The happy life is the life of virtue—aretē (ἀρετή). This word derives from aristos, which is the superlative of agathos, which means ‘good’. So, aretē essentially means ‘bestness’, which justifies translating it as ‘excellence’ or ‘perfection’—the Latin for it is virtu, which roots in ‘man’ (vir).2 The central idea is that aretē is a sort of competence for dealing (or coping) with human existence, or for actualising humanity in one’s person: a competence for crafting a life (see 8.3: artifex vitae). Hence the early Stoics: ‘Virtue is a consistent character, choiceworthy for its own sake and not from fear or hope or anything external. Happiness consists in virtue since virtue is a soul which has been fashioned to achieve consistency in the whole of life’ (D. L. VII 89, LS 61A). A virtuous life is thus a complete life. Such a life essentially involves reason, the intellect, and judgement (cf. 6.2). (9) Pleasure. For Epicureans, pleasure is the highest good, which is self-evident or at least based on empirical evidence: the ‘cradle argument’ (see LS 21A, L). A life well lived maximizes pleasure—understood as the pleasure of being free from bodily pain and mental upheaval (aponia). Later Epicureans distinguish between kinetic pleasures, which involve a process of satisfying some desire, and static pleasures, which appear when we are pleased about not being in distress: like a delight about being free from regret, shame, fear, or anxiety. As the pleasure we feel when our lives go well for us it accompanies eudaimonia. This seems in tune with experience: to be without pain or disturbance feels great and wonderful—it is a pleasure, linked with calmness of mind (atarxia, ἀταραξία).3 Epicurean therapy aims to remove our empty or false beliefs, for they are the source of our suffering: luxurious desires, say, are a problem insofar as we are mistaken about their (true) value. Since the most disturbing pain is the fear of death, the first belief to be ‘cured’ is that death is dreadful. (This is essentially on a par with Stoicism.) 2 In Plato’s Meno, one of the first definitions of virtue in the conversation is as a sort of manliness (71e). 3 Seneca finds this really odd; see Letter 67.15. This work is licensed by the University of Oxford under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 UK: England & Wales Licence .

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